In Unprecedented Move, Spent Fuel Rods To Be Removed from Fukushima Reactors - Extended [View all]

[BelgianMadCow]

Interview about the removal of spent fuel rods starting at Fukushima on TRNN.

A very good discussion, and very useful to the people that are concerned on DU.

Key points I took away from it:
- the removal of the spent fuel rods is necessary because they are in a (series of) pool several floors up in a highly damaged building in an earthquake-prone area.
- that removal is very risky, because the machines normally used for that are destroyed, and the operators don't have the normal experience since they have to be rotated all the time. The rods can ignite if they go uncooled, or break during transport.
- however, new machines have been built to do it now, and given remote operation I would guess that means at least those operators can stay on the job & be highly qualified

So it's a very risky operation, keep our fingers crossed.

We also learn that:
- radiation from Fukushima is being detected at the US west coast at levels higher than what can be explained by the initial accident - meaning it's coming from the continuing leak of some three hundred tonnes of radioactive water per day at the site.
- however, that radiation level is comparable to the dose that we (still!) get from nuclear tests, so it's not a cause for immediate & high alarm
- that being said, all radiation damage accumulates, and each dose increase increases cancer risks
- therefore, and given the large number of people affected, the US (and other) govts should monitor radiation very closely, especially in seafood, and report it more and publicly.

So those on DU pooh-pooing the risks have their head in the sand. But some of the reports posted here are overly alarmist, too.

Stay vigilant, push for transparency, and take no unncessary food risks, especially with (unborn or other) babies, I would say.

Note: I went to check the organisation the consulted nuclear engineer is president of, the Institute for Energy and Environmental Reasearch. They seem to be a watchdog group, from their mission:

IEER’s aim is to provide people with literature which has a quality equal to that in scientific journals, but which doesn’t require you to go back to college to get a degree in science to understand it.

Our audience is that of the determined activist concerned about the world, the concerned policy-maker, and the knowledgeable journalist. We choose our subjects so that they are relevant to environmental protection and other aspects of human well-being.

We rely mainly on primary scientific literature and official documents, and our work has held up well to intense scrutiny by the U.S. Department of Energy and its contractors, as well as others who have reason to dislike our conclusions.

From their background:

In 2006 we launched the Healthy from the Start campaign to include women, children, and future generations in environmental health standards.
Since 2008 IEER has worked with state and local-level efforts to implement Carbon-Free, Nuclear-Free through technical reports, testimonies and technical comments.
Finally IEER continues to work to prevent the development of proliferation-prone technologies such as reprocessing and breeder reactors.